We were assured, by Clapper and the NSA's defenders, that only metadata was being collected on American citizens (for example, "Sally Smith sent an email from IP Address 123.45.678.9 at 11:53:08 p.m. on June 12, 2014, to edjones@acme.cz"). We now know that is not true. We now know that the NSA would save the content of the email, and any attachments -- for example the lingerie photo Sally thought only Ed would see. And we know that this "private" communication and attachment(s) could be, and was, accessed by a low-level contractor.

"You can't know which emails to collect until you know which emails to collect." The NSA says that the precedent set by Smith v. Maryland gives them the right to collect all Americans' emails (and, presumably, to record all phone calls). To quote Randy Barnett of Georgetown U.:

The paradigm of what the Fourth Amendment prohibited as “unreasonable” in its first sentence was the use of general warrants, which is why its second sentence requires that warrants must be particular. And, as USD law professor Donald Dripps has shown, the seizure of papers for later search for evidence of criminal conduct was the epitome of an unreasonable search and seizure that was closely akin to general warrants. - Washington Post, April 28, 2014

So, which emails to collect? When it comes to Americans' emails: Legally, constitutionally, the ones you have a warrant to collect. Not all the emails you might potentially need some day in the course of an unforeseen investigation.

And if my granddaughter's bathtub photo is among the data collected and stored, it's cold comfort to reflect that the NSA's data banks (purportedly) include only a fraction of a percent of all communications.

Not Impossible Labs just revealed the Brainwriter, designed to read and write brain waves for fully paralyzed people so they can draw and communicate, and it's now on display in London.

At a new tech exhibition in London on Thursday, sitting between Google Glass and Oculus Rift, is a wearable you've probably never heard of. But it's the one that could have more of a revolutionary, world-changing impact than any of us realize.

It's called the Brainwriter -- and it's an open source, do-it-yourself device that pairs with ocular recognition technology to enable the fully paralyzed to draw and communicate. It is on exhibit at the Barbican's "Digital Revolution" in London as the headliner in the "Wearable Technologies" section.

"Not Impossible is a very small rag-tag group of incredibly passionate people, so it's an honor being at this exhibition, being next to behemoth companies like these," said Mick Ebeling, the founder of Not Impossible, a startup based in Venice, California. The Not Impossible Foundation raises money to fund the crowdsourced projects of the lab, which is run by a small team under Ebeling's lead.

The Federal Trade Commission on Tuesday called on Congress to protect consumers against the unchecked collection and sharing of their digital data — from websites visited to their marital status — by providing people with tools to view, suppress and fix their information.

The agency also said the little-known companies, called data brokers, that analyze and sell huge amounts of the consumer information for marketing purposes, needed to be reined in and more transparent to the public.

Companies that trade in consumer data, the agency said in a 110-page report about the industry, suffered from “a fundamental lack of transparency.”

“You may not know them, but data brokers know you,” Edith Ramirez, chairwoman of the F.T.C., said in a conference call. It is an industry, she said, that “operates largely in the dark,” yet it has remarkably detailed information that includes online and store purchases, political and religious affiliations, personal income, and socioeconomic status.

Whenever somebody tells me they'd like to know more about jazz but just don't know where to start, I loan them Kind of Blue. That's the best door in I know of.

Trane's Giant Steps (OK, released in 1960 -- but recorded in 1959), Thelonious Monk at Town Hall, Jazz in Silhouette by Sun Ra. And later that year and into 1960, Miles and Gil Evans record Sketches of Spain. It's as though every orchid in the world bloomed at once.

And Sonny Rollins was on sabbatical, playing on the bridge every night, germinating his own musical garden.

1. The "Obama" part, of course.
2. It's a government program that helps people in need.

#1 is simple, as we've discussed on hundreds of DU threads since January 2009. Right-wingers think Obama is the Anti-Christ.

#2 is the other key, I think. Their orthodoxy tells them that nothing the government does can possibly be any good, except intrusions into private morality and the military. But it's more than that. I really believe a lot of them have this Randian/Libertarian view that if you're in need, it's your own fault. And any help you get should come from your church. (What? You don't have one?? Then just die.)

Many on the Right apparently take satisfaction in punishment of the "indolent" by means of the free market's Invisible Hand. When poor people suffer, when government employees lose their pensions, or when the buyers of sub-prime mortgages lose their homes, it's their proof that "the system is working." Of course, many of them don't actively relish this suffering -- more often they're just indifferent to the suffering. If forced to consider the misery, the general reaction is "What do I care? It's not me or my family."

I know you know all this... I'm just scratching my head along with you over their illogic and obliviousness. (And I'm lumping all conservatives into the same mindset, when really there are variations and nuances within the group. But I think this describes the prevailing mindset.)

Sometimes in a paranoid moment, it seems to me that this is just the end game of an elaborate right-wing conspiracy to get the Heritage Foundation's plan in place. But the way it's played out, with all the attempts to stifle "a government takeover of health care," I really think it's more that the RW spinmeisters have manipulated the popular conservative imagination into seeing the ACA as the demonic offspring of Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. We hear the law described as the undoing of the Constitution, proof that Obama is a dictator, a victory for Marxism, the triumph of evil in this world, and so on.

In a weird way, I have to just stand back and marvel at the ability of the right-wing brainwashing apparatus to convince their flock that a plan based on an industry-friendly model cooked up by a conservative think tank (and implemented by a Republican governor) is somehow "socialism."

And I predict, that like moon landing-deniers, many of them will never believe the successes of the ACA are for real, no matter how much evidence is presented to them.

The first thing I thought of when I heard about the nuclear deal with Iran was the amazing Rick Steves TV program, Iran: Yesterday and Today. I know it takes a lot of hard diplomatic work to make a deal like this succeed, but somewhere in the mix, doesn't Rick Steves deserve some credit for nudging public opinion just a bit and humanizing the people of Iran?

As he says at the end of the documentary:

Iran is an ancient and proud land, with a rich culture. Traveling here, it felt like a paradox, its contradictions difficult to understand. While our governments may be at odds, the people we met were consistently curious, generous, and friendly. I found that, like in my country, there's a tension between modern and traditional, liberal and conservative, secular and religious.

Maybe we're all just struggling to defend the moral fabric of our respective society. I've been wondering to what extent the U.S.A.-Iran tensions might be explained by caring people on both sides motivated by love and fear. And the flip side of fear is understanding.

... I came to Iran a little nervous. I leave impressed more by what we have in common than by our differences. I've overcome my fear by getting to know the Iranian people. Granted, there are no easy solutions to the problems confronting our two nations. But surely, getting to know this culture is a step in the right direction.

I'm Rick Steves. Happy travels. And as they say here, "Peace be upon us."

And here's the whole documentary -- well worth your time to watch the entire thing: